Reminders of the Past
by Charity Angel
Summary: In which problems rear their ugly heads, Dean and Claire get desperate and Sam tries to solve everything. [The Things We Cling To #3]
1. Chapter 1

_This is part three of the series that starts with 'The Things We Cling To'. You really should start there._

 _Previously: Sam and Claire conspired to get Dean and Cas together in the hope that their epic love for each other will nullify the Mark of Cain, and Claire discovered she was pregnant._

* * *

After Amelia, Sam hadn't given any further thought to the possibility of children being in his future. There hadn't been a woman, for starters, and there had been the trials, the fallen angels, Abaddon, Metatron, the Mark of Cain… Sam had been too damn busy, too wrapped up in supernatural machinations to even think that he had slipped into his thirties with every last prospect of a normal life shattered.

Then Claire had sat him down one day, to distract him from the fact that Dean and Cas were having some fairly energetic sex, and told him that she was in trouble, and she wasn't sure what to do. Sam wished he was more surprised, but the kid had been in the system for three years after being abandoned by her mom. She had bailed and pretty much lived on the damn streets: it was probably a miracle that this was her first kid. The first thing that did surprise him was that Dean had worked it out first. That kind of made sense too, though, given that he had spent the most time with Claire. They had been trapped in the bunker together while he and Cas were working cases, so he had seen her through the majority of her morning sickness. And the mood swings, she admitted, blushing into her decaf.

The second thing that surprised him was that Castiel had known all along and said nothing. Not to Sam, anyway. He had only told Claire herself a couple of days beforehand. And he was being completely… Well, actually, he was being his normal, taciturn self about it. And both of them had promised to help her through this, no matter what.

"But…"

She trailed off, and Sam could easily see that it was the decision-making process that was really eating her up inside. Until now, she had been able to distract herself with the whole Mark business and getting Dean and Cas together. Now that they were (and audibly so on occasion), Claire was dwelling on this.

"How can I put a baby into the system?" she blurted out. "The system sucks. But I can't exactly go through the regular adoption channels, can I? We don't even have a real address, or healthcare, or anything. My sonograms are going to consist of an angel keeping tabs on me. But how can I look after a baby? I… I'm unloading on you, aren't I?"

Sam smiled at her. "Maybe, but I don't mind." He shrugged. "I guess it's not like you've got anyone around here to talk to: Cas isn't all that chatty, and Dean's allergic to emotion. So, tell me what you want to do."

She seemed to shrink in on herself. "I don't know," she admitted, her voice all but a whisper. "I really don't. I'm so not ready to be a mom, but what other choice is there? Cas told me it's already got a soul, so I can't just kill it. And the only option I've got to give it up is to dump it on a church doorstep, which'll land it in the system."

She paused and scrubbed at her face with her hands. "God, I'm whining about this, but I'm so much better off than I would have been with Dustin. How the hell would we have raised a kid together? He's a total flake – that job at the Weiner Hut was the third one in a month. I know I'm an idiot for falling for Randy's happy family thing, but… God, the bastards actually emotionally blackmailed me into doing that job at the convenience store, you know. Some role models they would have been, huh?"

Sam snorted. "Dean and I are convicted murderers," he told her. "We're also convicted bank robbers. Cas can't face Heaven after his whole 'God' thing. We lie and steal and cheat for a living."

Claire shrugged. "But at least you do it because there's something worse out there," she pointed out. "Yeah, so you might not be perfect, but you're better than most. You see something wrong with the world and you try to fix it. I mean, I know I've been down on you, but you're the good guys. And I kind of feel like I belong here. I'm doing something useful, even if I can't actually hunt."

Sam smiled. "At the risk of a chick-flick moment, I think it's pretty obvious we feel the same. I know Dean and Cas have already said this, but we'll all stand by whatever decision you make."

She gave him a sideways glance, hugging her mug tightly again. "I've got a few months before I need to worry. And we don't know what's going on with Dean yet, then there's Cas' grace to think about."

Sam figured that Claire was about as good at dealing with her emotions, and with what was right in front of her, as the rest of them. That fit, given how well she was slotting into their weird little family. Dean had always referred to Charlie as the little sister he never wanted, but Claire was starting to feel like the little sister that Sam _had_ always wanted. Sam had always wanted a younger sibling, someone who would look up to him, who would be on his side when Dean got too bossy, someone who would keep him company when Dean went out. He figured that was why he had been so protective of Adam; the real little brother he had never known (and knowing he was still trapped downstairs, Sam had been researching ways into the Cage as a side-project). Charlie was a good friend, but Claire felt like a sister – someone he should be taking care of. And he would.

.oOo.

Another month found the four of them in Sheldon, Iowa, on a ghost hunt. Claire had been climbing the walls of the bunker; it was a simple salt-and-burn, and it was only a short distance from the bunker – far enough for them to stay over, but close enough that if things went south, they could get Claire out and back to safety quickly. Plus, she had been complaining that she couldn't hunt properly, and ghosts were a good way of cutting one's teeth.

They had gotten two motel rooms, and they set up the wall in Sam and Claire's because neither of them wanted to have to deal with Dean and Cas' love nest. That first glow of the relationship hadn't worn off yet, and they tended to be joined at the lips at every possible occasion. And their sheets were being washed far more than was natural. Sam really, really didn't want to know what they got up to behind closed doors, and he was pretty sure that Claire didn't either. So they got custody of the info wall, which meant that Sam got to watch Claire piece things together. She had really gotten into the research thing while she was cooped up, and now that she was over the morning sickness, but pre-house-sized, she was really getting into the whole hunting gig. Sam personally wasn't so sure that was a good idea – he was thinking of how his dad had been, absent half the time, dragging him and Dean up on the road, and he really didn't want that for Claire's kid.

But it wasn't exactly his place to say anything, and she was doing so well. She was going to be an awesome hunter if she decided that was the way she wanted to go with her life.

"Yes!"

He looked up from the old newspaper he was browsing online. "What?"

"We have a grave," Claire announced cheerfully. "An actual burial. And I am totally going to pull the pregnancy card to avoid the digging here. So, you noticed how much Dean's not rubbing at the Mark these days?"

Sam snorted at the change of topic. Not that he could blame her – with four of them present, there was no way he was digging that grave solo. They could wait until Dean and Cas got back from 'getting food'.

"Yeah, I noticed. You definitely killed it with that one."

She grinned at him. "Like it was hard to piece that together. You guys should have done it ages ago. I mean, you're supposed to be smart, Stanford."

Sam regretted telling her about his foray into college. He had been trying to tempt her into wanting to go so that she might want to go back to school, but he was rapidly realising that she was more like Dean than him. With a touch of Charlie's mad computer skills thrown in for good measure. She had teased him mercilessly for his choice of prestigious college, and his course choice for days ("Lawyer, really? Aren't they just, like, demons in training?").

"Maybe we just needed the fresh set of eyes," he said. "We'd been staring at it for too long."

"You were going about it all the wrong way," she countered. "You were trying to figure out a way to get rid of the damn thing, even though Cas said it wasn't possible."

"Yeah, I know. We going to rock on Cas' grace after this?"

Her eyes widened, just a fraction, her smile slipped. She hesitated. "Yeah, sure."

Sam frowned. That wasn't the reaction he had expected at all: he thought she would be psyched to be moving on to solve the problem of Cas – the one that would save his life (and possibly theirs too: Dean could still flip if Cas died, and they would be right in the firing line).

"Claire, what's wrong?"

"Dean didn't tell you?"

He shoved his laptop out of the way and leaned over the table. "Tell me what?"

She shrank back. "We all already know how that works," she said bitterly. "You've got some gadget back at the bunker that can suck it right out of me. One ex-vessel required, right?"

Dean and Cas picked that moment to return. Over Claire's shoulder, Sam could see Dean's cheerful expression slip into something resigned. Cas, however, looked horrified. They had clearly picked up enough to work out the rest of the conversation. And from what Claire had said, Sam already assumed that she and Dean had already had that conversation.

"Claire, no," Sam began, remembering exactly what it had been like when Cas had extracted Gadreel's grace from him.

"Claire, I would never subject you to that," Cas said softly behind her. She pushed back from the table, spinning to look at him. She looked desperate, betrayed.

"The procedure of which you speak is painful," Cas continued. Sam felt it wasn't helping until he added: "It very nearly killed Sam when I tried to extract Gadreel's leftover grace from him. I would never dream of performing it again on anyone, and certainly not on you. I never want to cause you pain again, Claire."

She relaxed, and Dean pulled her into a firm, supportive hug.

"I told you so," he said, softly but still audible to everyone else. "I said that's not why we want you around."

"God, no," Sam chipped in. "Is that what you've been thinking this whole time?"

Claire just about managed to shake her head against Dean's shoulder. He relaxed his arms a little and she turned her properly so she could reply.

"Not the whole time. Just… the grace thing keeps coming up, and then I wonder. Because I'm awful handy, if it ever comes down to it."

Cas stiffened. "I would never take your life just to save my own. No-one's life is worth less than mine, to be sacrificed just so that I might live. There has been too much death already."

Claire made an odd whimpering sound in the back of her throat and reached out an arm to Cas. He barely hesitated before accepting.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't want to think it, but…"

Cas' arms tightened around her. "I understand."

.oOo.

Charlie was amazing. She turned up out of the blue (okay, Sam suspected there was a phone call from Dean involved) with a hard drive full of chick-flicks and a cooler full of ice cream. And absolutely no agenda about fangirling over Cas at all. The girls clicked over their love of Buffy (which, what the hell? How was Claire even old enough to have seen that?) and promptly hijacked the plasma screen for a vidfest, kicking the guys out.

Except Cas. Apparently he didn't quite count as a guy, and he wanted to see a chick-flick for himself, having heard the reference, gotten the file-dump of info, but never actually having had the experience of watching one. But Cas vacated after only a few hours and dragged Dean off to their room for some loud, bendy sex. Because Cas was disturbingly bendy, Sam had discovered; and so was Claire. Apparently she and Jimmy had some kind of thing with their spines that made them extra-flexible, but could run the risk of paralysis if they pushed it too far. Cas had pointed out with a gentle smile that he had tweaked just enough in both Jimmy and Claire's bodies so that scary loss of mobility wasn't a problem any more, but allowed them to keep their freakish flexibility.

In the morning, Dean twitched every time he looked at the mess in the kitchen, but left it for the two girls to clear up when they finally emerged around lunchtime. They tidied sheepishly and partook of the bacon and eggs Dean provided before washing up and cracking out the books, exchanging glances all the time. Sam wondered, but Charlie assured him that it wasn't like that, they would only ever just be good friends, and Claire didn't swing that way anyway.

Charlie stayed for a week – long enough for Dean to insist that they dismantle the blanket fort in the TV room – until she left to follow a lead. But Claire's phone pinged regularly after that, and Charlie would pop by for a night or so here and there, a place to crash as she followed leads Sam couldn't even fathom. They started keeping her room made up for her.

.oOo.

It took Dean another month, standing in the middle of an aisle Wal-Mart, before he realised. He pushed up his sleeve frantically. There sat the Mark, dull and pink and looking perfectly harmless. A slow smile spread across his face.

"Cas," Sam said, simply.

"Huh?"

Sam grabbed him and pulled him along, picking up a can of tuna on the way past.

"The Mark's all about hate and anger, right? And Cas is all about… you going to make me say it?"

Dean eyeballed him. "Hell no. You're enough of a girl as it is. Any further down that road and you and Claire'll be braiding each other's hair and shopping for baby clothes."

Sam shook his head. "Shopping for baby clothes is kind of practical these days," he pointed out. "Unless you hadn't noticed that Claire's five months' pregnant? We could do with thinking about baby stuff."

Dean gave him an odd look. "Something you know that I don't? 'Cause last I heard, she didn't know if she was keeping it."

Sam shrugged and pushed their cart on to the next aisle. "Doesn't hurt to think about the future."

Dean stared even more, as if he was trying to read Sam's mind, figure out what was going on there. Sam almost wished that he could, because he wasn't sure what he was thinking himself. Sometimes he absolutely hated the idea of Claire's baby living with them – with four hunters as role models, and the ever-present threat of at least one of them not coming home one day. And then probably getting resurrected somehow, just for shits and giggles (seriously, Sam was starting to think that God just liked screwing with them for the hell of it, just because he didn't want their story to be over). But yeah, sue him, he had been thinking about how nice it would be if they could do something as normal as raising a kid, whether it was his or not.

He had to suppress a smile when he realised suddenly that, technically, from a purely genetic point of view, this was Cas' grandkid. Oh yeah, that was going to be some awesome mocking material when the right time came. Because Cas wasn't going to mind being called 'grandpa', but Dean was. Dean, at the age of thirty-six, was going to mind a hell of a lot. It was going to be awesome, and Sam had held back on the mocking for a while now, what with all the crap with the Mark (and yeah, being kind of worried that Dean would rip his head off – literally – if he pushed too much). He hadn't even really teased Dean about finally having a stable relationship, and he was _dying_ to do that. Now was probably the right time – two months in, with the Mark apparently dormant. But, Cas was still dying, and Sam was sure there were some insecurities there that he didn't want to shake up. Because he was worried that Dean would do his standard thing when something uncomfortably emotional came up – bail.

Jeez, their family was fucked up.

.oOo.

The bunker was quiet. Claire's car was missing, which probably meant she had either gone out for groceries or nipped out to the public library. Maybe she had taken Cas with her? Because Sam hadn't expected to get back from his run to find no-one around. Granted, he was back a lot earlier than normal – he forgot his wallet and hadn't been able to make his usual stop at the diner, and so had powered through and looped back over an hour earlier than usual.

As he made his way towards the bathroom, Sam realised that the place wasn't quite as quiet as he had thought at first: someone was definitely home and, by the sounds of things, in pain, judging by the grunt. Had Dean slipped in the shower? It didn't seem like him (Sam was the klutz of the family), but stranger things had happened. The water was still running, so it was possible.

He realised slightly too late, as he pushed the bathroom door open, that Cas hadn't gone out at all, and that Dean wasn't lying helplessly on the bathroom floor clutching at an injured part of his body. Oh no.

"Ohhhh fuck! Cas, why the hell didn't you tell me it was this good?"

"Would you have believed me?"

Far from what Sam had thought, Dean was on his feet, his arms braced against the wall of the communal shower. Cas was behind him, far too close to be innocent even if Sam had been able to delude himself that he hadn't just heard his brother moan like a two-bit whore.

Dean snorted, which turned into a weird, breathless gasp as Cas's hips snapped forward. "Fair point."

Sam shut the door as quietly as possible and tried not to think about what was happening on the other side. Because seriously? Fucking in the shower? Fair enough, the shower had probably seen more than its fair share of spunk over the years, since both he and Dean had been living there solo for a couple years now, and it had been occupied by lonesome men for two decades beforehand, back in the forties and fifties, but that was far, far more than he ever wanted to know. And he was going to have to use the shower later too, with the image of Cas fucking Dean in his mind's eye.

And wasn't that something to marvel over – over-compensatingly straight Dean, taking it from Cas?

.oOo.

Claire never got excited about the baby. Sam had been expecting her to as time went on, but not even Charlie had been able to drum up any kind of eagerness about the big arrival. Claire she didn't do anything that one might anticipate from an expectant mother. Except for the weird cleaning instinct, that was: with about six weeks to go, she started working pretty much constantly, scrubbing every possible surface and dusting the ones that weren't. Okay, so she would collapse in a heap at the end of each day, but the bunker had never been so clean.

But she still wasn't excited. Or even appeared to have made a decision about what she was going to do.

Eventually, Sam and Dean took it upon themselves to sit her down. Cas abstained on the grounds of looking too much like her dad.

"Claire, we need to buy a crib," Dean said, bluntly.

Sam scowled at him. "What Dean means is…"

"I know what he means," Claire butted in. "I know my time's running out; that I have to decide something, but I can't. I don't want my last three years to be my baby's whole life, but I don't want it to have your life either. Because there's pretty much no way I can give up this. I know what's out there."

The brothers exchanged sad smiles.

"I get that," Dean said. "I do. I got out once, tried to be a dad to my girlfriend's kid, but I couldn't stay out and it nearly got them killed. And being Dad's kids nearly got us killed a whole bunch of times too."

"But this is about the safest place on the planet," Sam pointed out, since they were trying to reassure Claire rather than scare the crap out of her. "We were in crummy motel rooms all the time, and it sucked. But we can work it like we have been, so that there's always one of us here to keep you company and help you look after the kid. And you have no idea how much use you've been – it's kind of like having Bobby again, watching our backs, finding all the obscure lore. I'm really tempted to see if Charlie can install us a phone system like he had – you know, like his FBI line? If there's someone here all the time, we can have that backup."

"Would be pretty awesome: having backup made things so much easier," Dean mused before turning to Claire. "Bobby used to have a second phone line he used to pose as the FBI, so that we could pretend to have a boss someone could phone to confirm who we are. Garth picked it up after Bobby died, but then he went and got bit by a werewolf."

Claire gave them both her best unimpressed-teen look, but Sam could tell that she liked that they were still working so hard to include her in the life.

"I'll think about it," she said, promising nothing. But she let Dean buy a crib from Craigslist and work on it until he was happy it was clean and safe. And she smiled when he presented it, in the room that used to be Cas', the one between hers and theirs. Dean and Cas had painted the room in a soft lemon, and promised to pick up some extra furniture and a diaper genie.

.oOo.

In hindsight, the eating should have been a giveaway: Cas had been eating bits and pieces of meals for weeks. And he had stopped pulling faces at the flavour of the food a couple of weeks back.

Dean really should have told them when Cas started sleeping. Especially when he started sleeping every night.

They definitely should have noticed before he sneezed.

"It is a cold," Cas said defensively in response to three sets of accusing eyes suddenly on him. "I am fairly certain it is non-lethal."

"But you don't get colds," Dean pointed out.

Claire chucked Cas the box of Kleenex that had been living by her elbow for the last week or so, ever since her hormones had her crying at every last little thing.

"I will be fine," Cas complained even as he wiped his nose.

Claire snorted at that. "Yeah, sure. Whatever."

"Dude, if you're getting sick, there's not much time left," Sam said gently.

"I meant, you know, man-flu," Claire responded. "But that too."

Dean, eyeing Cas warily, grabbed his laptop. "Let's get to work, people."

.oOo.

Dean was doing a really bad job of hiding just how much he was worrying: between caring for Cas (who, as per Claire's prediction, was tucked up in bed within the day), he was alternating between staring at Google search results and snapping at Claire and Sam whenever he felt they weren't working hard enough. Sam could and would take Dean's bad temper, because he knew that Cas was everything – quite literally these days – to Dean. Cas was the one thing keeping Dean from sliding into a murderous rage that would send him spiralling into demon-hood, so Cas' wellbeing was Dean's ultimate priority.

But Claire couldn't take it, and she then got annoyed with herself for not putting up with it like she wanted to be able to. She couldn't sit still for the hours on end that Dean demanded. She needed to get up, to get her circulation moving, to pee, to eat and drink. Sam had given her his iPad so she could work as she wandered (and she did, tablet propped on her bump), but it still wasn't enough for Dean. They snapped and snarled at each other until Claire pretty much collapsed, exhausted, for a couple of hours' worth of nap twice each day.

None of them were eating properly, except Cas. And, on the odd occasions that they did manage to scarf down a meal, Claire was puking it right back up again within the hour. Which stressed them both out more.

"Dean, she's trying her best," Sam eventually said, stopping his brother from storming the bathroom Claire was currently holed up in. "She wants to help. But you're making it impossible – all this stress is _making_ her sick, man. And it's not doing you any good, either. You both need a good night's sleep and some proper food if you want to help Cas properly."

Dean, wide-eyed and betrayed, did at least step back. "What are you saying?"

Sam didn't move from the door, but relaxed his shoulders a little. "I'm saying we've been at this four days straight. We all need some sleep, so our brains can work and we can come up with some new ideas. We need a decent meal, a bit more balanced than frozen burgers and burritos. A little fresh air might help too."

He glanced at his watch. "Go and spend some time with Cas," he said. "He's feeling lousy and probably wants to know that you still love him even when he's gross and pathetic. I'll fix us all something healthy for lunch, and we'll all sit and eat it at the kitchen table. All four of us. Not working. Then I'm taking Claire out for a walk, and you should probably help Cas get some air too. After that, we can get some more research done."

Dean growled. Actually growled, and for a moment, Sam wondered if he had let things go too far before stepping up and saying something. Just how dark was the Mark right now? How much was Dean feeling its effects? For a moment, Sam was worried he and Dean were actually going to come to blows, and Dean would probably kick his ass into next week. For a moment, he panicked that his brother was lost to him. Again.

Then Dean groaned and scrubbed at his face. He looked haggard, with dark circles under his eyes and almost a week's worth of beard.

"Okay," he said, rubbing unconsciously at the Mark. So it _was_ bothering him. "Okay. Just, don't burn my kitchen down, yeah?"

Sam gave a little huff of relieved laughter. "Sure."

.oOo.

Alone in the kitchen, Sam chopped some of the vegetables he knew he had bought on their last shopping trip. Taking his frustrations out on some hapless carrots was much better than taking them out on Dean. Or Cas, or Claire.

He hadn't made soup for years. It was pretty much the only thing he had ever learned to cook – Dean had always cooked for him, or Jess. Even Amelia had whipped up some meals on her days off. Sam had never gotten past making boxed mac and cheese. He had survived most of his first year at Stanford on ramen noodles and salad because everything else was a total disaster. Then had come Jess, who had at least shown him how to boil vegetables properly, and make her favourite vegetable soup. She always wanted it when she was sick: her version of Dean's tomato and rice. Jess had put tiny little stars in her soup, but rice would do for today. Dean would probably appreciate the comforting aspect of rice in soup, and Cas wouldn't know that it wasn't right anyway.

There was even half a sourdough loaf, probably courtesy of Claire. Apparently Cas really liked it (and Jimmy had too), so she had probably bought it for him when he first got sick, before Dean turned into a complete obsessive maniac. It would go great with the soup.

Once everything was cooking, he took a moment to pray. Not to God, because he had given up on that the day Joshua had told them God didn't give a shit about anything that happened; not to Cas, because there wasn't much point in that, given that he didn't exactly have the means to do what Sam needed right now; not to Gabriel since he was a bit dead these days: he prayed to Hannah – the one angel he knew was completely and utterly on their side, in this at least.

"I know you don't think much of Cas' choices," he said, letting his mind slip easily into the prayer, "but I know you care about him. He really needs help right now. He's getting sick again, and I don't think he's got too much time left.

"He told me you gave up your vessel, and believe me, I get why. But you can still lean on Metatron, see if he'll break, can't you? We could really do with finding what's left of Cas' grace before…"

"Before he dies," Claire said softly, her hand sliding over Sam's and squeezing gently.

Sam nodded. "Please, Hannah. We really need any help you can give us. Your brother needs this, now more than ever."

He looked up, found Claire still standing with her hand clasped over his on the edge of the counter, wearing a shy little smile.

"You still pray?"

He shrugged. "Sometimes, to the right angel. We need all the help we can get right now, and Hannah has a soft spot for Cas."

"We'll get through this, Sam," she said gently. "You guys always do. Is there anything I can do to help in here?"

"Nah, I'm good."

She looked sceptical suddenly. "I've seen you burn toast."

He laughed. "Hey, I'm not touching the toaster this time, just making some soup. And it's just vegetables, so there's no food poisoning to be had either."

She gave him a bright smile and headed to the stove, lifting the lid of the pan.

"You checking up on me?"

"Yes," she said bluntly, but still smiling.

Sam tried to make his face look wounded, but he was still smiling broadly. "You don't trust me?"

"Nope. But this smells pretty good actually. I'm kind of impressed. You want me to go grab Cas and Adolf?"

"Give 'em five minutes." Sam sighed. "Dean means well."

"I know," she said. "I know he's upset about Cas, but he's not the only one. I'm just bitching at you so I don't do it at him and make him Hulk out. Sorry."

.oOo.

Lunch was nice – Dean had helped Cas take a shower, and he was feeling much more like himself, if a little snuffly. He was dressed in clean sweats and was showing an interest in them and what they had been doing for the last few days.

After they ate, with Cas and Claire only having a small portion each, Dean did take Cas out. Sam and Claire passed them sat in lawn chairs near the front door when they went out. Cas looked pale and washed out in the sunlight, but his eyes were bright as he took in the surrounding landscape. He was the only one who didn't seem all that worried about his situation: Cas actually appeared to be at peace as he relaxed next to Dean, their hands clasped together.

It was adorable, really, the way they were just together. Shower incident aside, now that the honeymoon was over, they weren't disgustingly 'together'; they were just Dean and Cas, just like they had always been, only with a little less unresolved sexual tension and a little more casual touching and hand holding.

Dammit, Cas needed to survive this. Because even without the whole Mark of Cain thing, losing Cas would be devastating for Dean. Everyone Dean cared for died – Mom, Dad, Bobby, Ellen, Jo – or left him because of the job – Cassie, Lisa. Cas understood the job, and had been around for years, but right now, not only could he die, but he was going to. Imminently.

And that was why Sam immediately forgave Dean when he cracked the whip and got them working the second they got back.

What he couldn't forgive was that the whip-cracking was exactly the same intensity as it had been before, and Claire was trying her best to work because she felt bad for the break they had had. Even Cas couldn't pry them away from the books and the internet when he shuffled in at ten thirty.

So Sam decided to make a stand. They were going to work themselves into the ground, and Sam could do with hearing from Hannah; he was hoping that she would dream-walk him like Lucifer used to do, only less sinister. Sam figured Hannah and the other angels were their best lead, and Dean was breaking his promise about the good night's sleep. Claire didn't sleep enough as it was because she was uncomfortable, and the last four days were definitely taking their toll. Sam brewed up a pot of Claire's decaf, since making coffee was one of the few non-research activities approved by Dean (although the decaf was severely frowned upon), and slipped a little something into their drinks. They had picked up the zolpidem during a hospital visit some time ago, and a little poking around online had turned up that while it generally wasn't recommended for use in pregnant women, none of the side effects would harm a baby so close to term, and certainly not in the half-dose Sam was giving Claire.

Dean was the first to succumb. Given that he had six times the dose Claire had, and hadn't slept a wink in the last four days, it was hardly a shock.

"You roofie him or something?" Claire asked incredulously, blinking sleepily at Dean's unconscious form.

"Yep. Cas, little help?"

Cas shuffled into the library a whole minute after Sam called. "Is everything okay?"

"Give me a hand getting Sleeping Beauty here to bed," Sam said.

Castiel raised his eyebrows imperiously. "You have drugged him."

"Yep. Problem with that?"

Cas sighed and grabbed one of Dean's arms. "I feel I should have a problem with it," he commented almost dryly, "but I believe he needs the sleep more than he knows. Dean seems to struggle with the concept that the human body actually requires sleep in order to function effectively."

"You'd think he'd know," Sam said, hauling Dean up. "You know, after what happened to me."

Cas got a distinctly uncomfortable look, and Sam realised too late that the whole insomnia and hallucinating the devil thing was one of those things he wasn't supposed to talk to Cas about. Mostly because they had all moved on but Cas still felt horrible about it. Sam had moved on to the point that he had actually genuinely forgotten that it had been Cas' fault in the first place. Mostly, anyway, since it couldn't have happened if he hadn't let the devil take him for a joyride.

"Cas, I…"

Cas held a hand up weakly to stop him. "Do not apologise for my discomfort," he said firmly. "It is good to be reminded of my sins occasionally, lest I cease to repent for them."

"It's okay, Cas," Sam assured him, giving him a little nudge with his fingers – all he could manage while they were hauling ass with Dean sleeping the sleep of the drugged between them. "I forgave you a long time ago. As fuck-ups go, we've both done worse."

"True," Cas allowed after a few long seconds of contemplation. He sounded tired, and now that Sam thought about it, he was dragging his feet. That was probably because he was still sick, Sam reminded himself: all this was happening because Cas got sick and they were desperate to save him. And four days under Herr Winchester's regime had yielded exactly squat, with a side of diddly.

Sam dropped Dean in bed with Cas and headed back to the library to find Claire's head drooping over her text. She looked up lazily when he entered.

"You… You roofied me too," she slurred, a finger wavering towards him in a slightly accusatory way.

"Only a tiny amount," he said as he lifted her into his arms. "Not enough to hurt the baby. You need some rest too, sweetie."

She was asleep before they reached her room, her face relaxed back into youth rather than the hard lines that reflected her life; a life that was only getting harder and was never likely to get any easier, not even if she left them and hunting behind and just became a mom. Because while Dean had done an awesome job, Sam could look back on his life and know that he had been difficult; that Dean had given up a lot for him. Dean had given _everything_ for him, including friends when they were little, when Sam had needed to learn to walk, to toilet train. Dean had taught him to read and write. Dean had encouraged him to do well at school, even though he had hidden it under his semi-jealous mocking. And now Claire was trapping herself in that same life, unless she accepted their help.

Sam sighed as he placed her gently on her bed. Her shoes slid off easily and he left them where she would be able to find them in the morning. He carefully rolled her onto her side and pulled the covers up over her. He didn't resist the urge to press a gentle kiss to her forehead and sweep her hair from her face before turning out the light and closing the door carefully behind him and heading for his own room to crash.

.oOo.

"Sam"

They were in the quad at Stanford, where Sam remembered spending many a happy hour studying in the blazing California sun with Jess and Brady. Hannah looked like her old vessel, Caroline: the lovely little brunette with soulful eyes; and those eyes looked sad, strained, tired. It was a shocking thing to see in an angel (that wasn't Cas).

"Hey Hannah. You okay?"

She sighed. "I am not made to rule. But otherwise I am as well as you might expect. You have asked something very difficult of me, Sam."

He shrugged. "I know. But Cas really needs help. He's dying, and if he does, Dean will lose everything."

She raised her eyebrows. "So it is true," she said. "The cherubim told me as much, but I didn't believe they would actually…"

Sam smirked. "Work it out? Yeah. I've lived with that for years. But they've worked it out, and it's keeping the Mark of Cain quiet."

That made her smile: it was a sweet thing that Sam could stand to see more often. "Finally, some good news. It appears that, once again, Lucifer has underestimated the human capacity for love." She glanced away, taking in the scenery, the sun that warmed right down to your soul. She turned her face to it, closing her eyes and smiling. It was a very human thing.

"I came to enjoy my time on Earth," she said, her eyes still closed. "I learned to appreciate the feelings and sensations my vessel could offer, like Castiel did. I know how powerful both love and lust can be." She turned back to him. "I think I understand what will happen to your brother when mine dies. And what will happen to you, and to Heaven. Castiel is important, but Metatron knows that. Castiel's grace is his only bargaining chip: it is potentially the only thing keeping him alive. There are many of my brothers and sisters who would kill him for what he did, but restrain themselves because he holds on to that one last secret."

"But once Cas is dead, his grace is useless anyway!"

Hannah actually rolled her eyes at that. "Perhaps I should find a way to take you to Heaven: perhaps you could find a way to explain that to Metatron. I haven't been able to yet. He is still under the impression that Castiel will continue to take the graces of other angels in order to survive. For someone who thrives on stories, he does not have much of a grasp on Castiel's character. I am not sure any of us do any longer, since he met you."

Sam slouched back against a nearby tree. "I know we screwed him over," he sighed. "Please, just… Please try."

She stepped into his space, squeezed her hand against his arm. "Whatever Castiel's misguided actions, his intentions have always been pure. And he is still my brother. Of course I will do all I can to help him. Please, keep praying to me and let me know how his health is? I fear I cannot see him past your home's warding sigils."

He gave her a little smile. "Sure thing. Right now, it's just a cold, but it's freaking Dean out. And he doesn't even know that this is how it started last time."

She took a position next to him, slipping her shoulder under his, resting against his arm casually. "I saw Castiel at his worst last time," she said carefully. "When he was his most sick. It was… hard to watch him deteriorate. Your brother will find it harder still."

"Yeah. And Claire's freaking out too. I can't shake the feeling she's going to do something stupid."

Beside him, something tightened in Hannah's shoulders, which amused him because she wasn't even really there, not in human terms. "Claire? The daughter of Castiel's vessel? She is with you?"

"Yeah. She's about to pop any minute and the stress isn't doing her any good. And she is completely obsessed with the fact that she's carrying some of Cas' original grace, you know, back from when he used her as a vessel."

He could feel Hannah's hesitation.

"What? It'll kill her, and we're not guaranteed it would work."

"It is true…" she said hesitantly "…that our former vessels carry a part of ourselves, unless it is interfered with by another angel. I have never heard of a method of extracting that grace before."

Sam shrugged. "It's human, not angel: the Men of Letters cooked up a syringe that can extract grace, but it's pretty brutal. Cas tried it on me, to track Gadreel, and he nearly killed me just for a tiny bit of grace. Cas is completely against it this time, and me and Dean agree with him. Or Dean did, _anyway_. I'll hide the syringe before they wake up."

Hannah moved back in front of him and squeezed his arm once again. There was an odd but kind look in her blue eyes. "Castiel is adamant that no more should die because of his mistake, Sam; Claire least of all. I will put every resource at my disposal into finding an answer. Farewell for now, Sam."

.oOo.

Next morning, before anyone else woke up, Sam hid the syringe in a file in the store room he was sure they weren't going to look at in the next couple of weeks. This turned out to have been a good move pretty quickly, because he caught Claire snooping around right after he finished his breakfast. She brushed it off easily enough, but he knew it was preying on her mind more now than ever.

Cas was the next to appear, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed despite the adventures of the previous evening. He was looking much better, and his presence gave Claire something more immediate to focus on. She immediately started making some pancake batter. She was flipping them onto plates when Dean appeared, bleary-eyed and glaring at Sam like he knew exactly what had been done to him. But the temptation of food, and the proof of Cas' current recovering health were too much, and the sour mood of the last week was all-but forgotten in a whirl of blueberry pancakes and syrup. Cas was healthy for the time being, and that was all that counted. They could be happy and take a little bit of extra time to get him back to one hundred percent. And when Charlie showed up just before lunch, things went from good to better: she was a breath of fresh air around the bunker, and knuckled down online with Sam and Claire just as soon as they had eaten.

Over the next couple of days, with a little prodding from Sam, Dean and Charlie persuaded Claire that even if she wasn't going to go back to school, she should at least take her GED. Between them, they focussed her energy towards that instead of searching for the syringe and fixating on her little reservoir of grace, but it was apparent fairly early on that her heart wasn't really in it. Not even when Jody arrived and started her prodding too.

.oOo.

Jody was their birthing expert: the only person they were on speaking terms with who actually had any real experience of the actual making of babies beyond the fun part. And boy did she seem to enjoy bossing them around: ordering them to make sure there were clean sheets, towels and a good enough sterile knife to cut the cord. Dean seemed affronted at the mere suggestion that his blades might be anything less than honed to perfection, then snuck off to boil something. And when the time came, they swung into action like a well-oiled machine. Charlie was all earnest and fascinated and brilliant at keeping Claire calm even as she was poking her tiny hand into places friends should not be putting hands. Jody was keeping a careful eye and assuring everyone that the initial stage could take many hours. Cas too was calm, but there was an edge of wonder in his eyes and his voice that told everyone just exactly how excited he was about this new arrival. Sam kind of stayed out of the way, as did Dean, figuring this was women's stuff (and once again, Cas didn't count as a guy. Sam doubted that Cas would ever truly count as a guy again, the shower notwithstanding).

They all ate and chatted as normal; Sam researched while Dean, Claire and Charlie tried to indoctrinate Cas into some violent game on the PS4 Charlie had hooked up for them. Jody shook her head in disbelief and purposefully didn't call home to check up on Alex three times before Same distracted her with a book on werewolf lore.

It was a fairly restless night, with Charlie camped out in Claire's room for moral support. But Sam crashed and didn't stir until early the next morning, woken by the bustle of movement along the corridor. Instinct drove him to grab his gun and open the door a crack before his senses kicked in and he discovered that it was only Dean, fetching a stack of old newspapers that Jody had insisted upon.

"Dude, I don't even want to know," Dean said easily as Sam fell in step with him, tucking the gun discretely into the waistband of his sleep pants. "Charlie said something about the waters and I stopped listening _right_ then."

"Good call, man. I'll, uh, I'll stay out the way."

"Yeah, grab a shower while the girls are occupied. Jody says it should only be about an hour tops before we have another mouth to feed."

Dean didn't mean it that way, Sam knew. In fact, Sam had a feeling that he and Cas (the proud grandparents-to-be) had been making secret plans about the kid to take the pressure off Claire, but that was only because of the silences that happened whenever someone else walked into the room. Although all of that had stopped when Cas got sick. That had been a reality check for them all.

Sam went and did as Dean had suggested, then made himself a fruit salad for breakfast, leaving enough for everyone else too, if they felt so inclined. By the time he finished that and his coffee (with Dean joining him, turning his nose up at the fruit salad and grabbing the Coco Pops instead), it was all over and Charlie was bouncing in to grab them and introduce them to Claire's daughter.

.oOo.

Hope Jaime Novak was a week old when Claire disappeared in the middle of the night. She left an adoption certificate citing Castiel Novak and Dean Winchester as Hope's parents ('issued' in the state of Illinois). All hell broke loose when Charlie wandered into the nursery and found it, along with the post-it saying only "I know how to save you."


	2. Epilogue

She had gambled on being interesting enough that _he_ would come in person, and he didn't disappoint. Not with the fact that he appeared, anyway.

"Claire Novak, unless I'm very much mistaken," he purred, all British smarm, just like Dean had said,

"You're Crowley?" she asked, folding her arms, putting on her best 'unimpressed teen' look. It was an expression she had perfected long ago, and it still worked on Sam and Charlie sometimes. And, apparently, several-hundred-year-old kings of Hell.

"You were expecting something else?"

She shrugged dismissively. "They said you were short but, you know, they're all giants. I figured they were exaggerating."

"Hey! Don't diss the suit: he served a purpose a few years back. So, whatever can I do for you, Miss Novak? Protection for you and the nipper? Cushy place and a nice job where they don't ask too many questions about high school diplomas? Or…"

"I want you to get what's left of Cas' grace out of me," she said bluntly. "I know you took it from that girl before, so you know how to extract it."

"She was…" he started to protest, as she had known he would. Yes, Adina had been an angel, but she was in a vessel and the fundamentals of the process were the same.

"And I want you to deliver it to Castiel. Directly to him, as intact as it will be when you take it from me. No finding loopholes, no finding your way around it. Once we're done, it goes straight to him, in its entirety."

He frowned at her, just a little, his eyes calculating. "And what do I get in exchange? Did you think you would get ten years for such a difficult request? Or did you maybe think you would get the one, like we talked your pal Dean into?"

"Nothing," Claire said, straightening up. "I expected nothing. You get my soul, right now."

That really got Crowley's attention.

"You would do that for him? You know what he's done in the past? The apocalypse? The Leviathans? The Fall of the angels?"

She looked levelly at him. I do, and I would." She smiled, cold and tight and calculating: "And you want him alive, or you wouldn't have saved him all those months ago. This suits your plan."

"And you don't want to try and trade that for more time?"

"If I have any more time, I might not have the courage to leave my daughter."

Crowley rolled his eyes. "Family. Try having mine then see if you feel like that."

"I don't have any except her," Claire snapped. "Your lot saw to that: you drove my Mom crazy and shot my Dad. And she's better off without me. So, do we have a deal?"

Crowley seemed to consider his options carefully. But she knew that this ultimately served his purposes as well as hers, whatever his undoubtedly nefarious purposes were. He _did_ want Cas alive, and so did she and everyone else.

"You know how this is sealed, I assume?" he asked her with a sly smile and a lascivious wiggle of his eyebrows.

"Won't exactly be a stretch for me," she said as acidly as she could. "You agree to all of my terms?"

"I deliver whatever grace I pull from you directly to Castiel, without hesitation, deviation etcetera etcetera. And in return, I get your soul on the same terms."

She grabbed the lapels of his overly-expensive jacket and pulled him close.


End file.
